Trust: A Novel

Kobo ebook | September 1, 2004

Money and conscience are at the heart of Cynthia Ozick's masterly first novel, narrated by a nameless young woman and set in the private world of wealthy New York, the dire landscape of postwar Europe, and the mythical groves of a Shakespearean isle. Beginning in the 1930s and extending through four decades, Trust is an epic tale of the narrator's quest for her elusive father, a scandalous figure whom she has never known. In a provocative afterword, Ozick reflects on how she came to write the novel and discusses the cultural shift in the nature of literary ambition in the years since.

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Money and conscience are at the heart of Cynthia Ozick's masterly first novel, narrated by a nameless young woman and set in the private world of wealthy New York, the dire landscape of postwar Europe, and the mythical groves of a Shakespearean isle. Beginning in the 1930s and extending through four decades, Trust is an epic tale of th...

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Reviews

Rated 5 out of
5 by
Paola M from
It did take me a while to get going - until chapter 28 it felt like a patchwork of intimate recollections more suited to a diary than to a memoir, with lists of names of family friends and acquaintances orphan of any note or description. They obviously meant a lot to the author, but as a reader I could not "get them" until I was well into the book. And then you will see that this is a very intimate memoir which feels very much like a necessity for Oz, who lays bare thoughts he hasn't shared with anyone so far, which gets more and more personal as we get to the end of the book. At some point I was ashamed at all this intimacy being laid out, and outraged at how he bares it all, I felt like being forced to spy through a keyhole, then just accepted the narration as an arm offered by a stranger to help you go through difficult terrain. Oz's writing is beautiful (I read the English translation by Nicholas de Lange): he describes places, situations, people and feelings with great precision and I did feel like a fly on the wall of his small, cramped apartment. The "dark years" separating the lives of its three occupants show at the same time great love and great sorrow. Humour is there, too, and at least three episodes (which I won't spoil for you) made me laugh out loud. This very personal history of family ties also peers into the political debates raging around the time of the institution of the state of Israel, and the difficult choices and moral dilemmas this carried with it. I am very glad I persevered, as this is a book that will stay with me for a long while.